


From Hell's Heart

by MaryAnne615



Category: Casino Royale (2006), James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies), Quantum of Solace (2008), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 16:21:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3902839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaryAnne615/pseuds/MaryAnne615
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>MI6, along with the CIA and two other spy agencies, have been chasing an international terrorist for a year.  Every time they think they have 'Ripper' and his henchmen cornered, he slips away.  When he is finally found, Bond finds out M has a secret that proves to be destructive for all concerned, including her husband.</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Hell's Heart

EIGHT MONTHS AGO

James Bond and Felix Leiter stood in the doorway and looked at the empty room. Obviously once the headquarters for Ripper and his henchmen, with empty food wrappers and dirty blankets lying around, now it was just an empty room. The trash mocked both agents, as if to say ‘keep up the good work, boys, you’re making this fun’. 

Despite their best intelligence reports, Ripper had once again managed to stay one step ahead of both MI6 and CIA.

Both spy agencies, along with France and Germany, had been chasing the group of terrorists that had one man who seemed to be the ringleader: a man at first identified as Jonathan Michaelson, who eventually became known as Ripper. The group’s mayhem had crossed the Channel onto the Continent and eventually across the pond to the United States, leaving behind a trail of bodies beaten and blown up, emptied bank accounts from cyber-attacks, and more than one intelligence agent dead or missing. 

“Bloody hell.” It was all Bond could think to say. He was so sure that he had had Ripper cornered. 

“I hear you, brother,” Felix replied. 

Both men turned and went out to the street to the waiting row of agency vehicles. Bond was a bit surprised to see M sitting in the last vehicle, a Range Rover that had obviously arrived after they had searched the building. She had her head down, focused on something in her hands. Bond guessed it was her mobile. 

“Bond, why is she here?” Felix asked, nodding his head towards her. 

“I don’t know. She always seems to manage to show up whenever we think we’re close to catching the bastard.” Bond looked at her for a moment then climbed into the vehicle to leave. He’d see her at the safe house later and give her a full report and some theories as to how Ripper had once again escaped their clutches.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

SIX MONTHS AGO

 

“Bond, how did he get away?” M asked him for the fourth time. She was standing behind her desk, leaning on her hands that were firmly planted on each side of her laptop. Bond could hear the frustration in her voice. It perfectly matched the frustration he felt.

“M, I don’t know. Our intelligence was good. He just...wasn’t there...” Bond’s voice trailed off. He didn’t like not having a good answer for her and MI6. Or CIA, or the French, or the Germans. 

Bond had followed a trail supposedly leading to Ripper across the UK and France, from Edinburgh to St. Pancras station to Gare du Nord station, finally ending up on the far north side of Marseilles, France. He and 009 had tracked him and three of his men to a dingy, dirty warehouse, only to find the structure abandoned. And not even recently...the newspaper left behind was two weeks old. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

THREE MONTHS AGO

 

“Open the channel,” M said as she briskly walked into the conference room, followed by Bond. Within seconds M’s assistant, Valerie, had the link open and the face of CIA Director, Ian Smithson, filled the monitor.

“M.”

“Director Smithson.”

There were brief, perfunctory nods towards one another before M opened the conversation.

“Our intelligence says that Ripper is in Barcelona. I’m sending agents there now and then I’m going to head there,” she said. Bond was surprised to hear the part about her going to Barcelona. Why did she always need to be there if they thought they were close to capturing Ripper?

“M, I disagree. I believe that he is here, in the US. We’ve got a viable lead that says he’s in Northern Virginia. Not far from this headquarters actually. I’m putting together a team to go and find him,” Smithson responded, looking down at some papers on his desk.

After watching the two spy agency heads interact over the past several years, Bond had noted that Smithson rarely held eye contact with M. He wasn’t sure if he was afraid of her, disliked her, was always distracted by something else when he spoke with her, or a combination of all three.

“He’s in Barcelona,” M said, a bit testily.

“Or Northern Virginia. Or neither,” Smithson retorted. He still didn’t hold eye contact with her, but Bond could see that this time it was because he was distracted by something else: someone was whispering in his ear.

M snorted and turned away, not willing to resort to some snide, unprofessional remark about CIA and its tactics to track criminals. 

M had known Ian Smithson for years, since they were both station agents for their respective agencies in Hong Kong leading up to the handover. They were professional acquaintances. Some would even call them friends: they had visited each other’s homes for short holidays and often traveled across the Atlantic for professional office visits. And Ian was one of the few people on earth who not only knew M’s real name, but actually addressed her by that name when they were in private.

She had been MI6 Chief for nine years when he was appointed Director of CIA. She was happy for him and had immediately called him to offer congratulations. She knew his abilities and was hoping that he would bring about needed change to the beleaguered American agency. But seven years later, she was still waiting. And she knew that Ian, nor any of his successors, would never be able to make CIA the agency it really needed to be.

M respected Ian, but hated the procedures used by the American government to oversee and run the agency. As a presidential appointee, the Director’s name was well-known in Washington and, in her opinion, the position was too political. She knew Ian made decisions based upon what the president who had appointed him thought or wanted and not on what the situation needed. Every time she dealt with CIA she was grateful for the anonymity that she had and the fact that her political leanings were never called into question or used as the basis for an operation. 

That didn’t mean she didn’t get her ass chewed on a regular basis by government oversight. It just meant she got that ass chewing when she, or her agents, truly messed up and not because someone thought she was operating outside of established political party lines.

“Well, Ian. One of us is wrong. Either way, I hope this ends today, whether it’s in Virginia or Barcelona,” she said.

Ian said nothing at first, just looked at her.

“We could both be wrong, M.” He paused for a moment, knowing that he had insulted her.

“Look,” he continued, “this guy is making us all a little crazy. I just want to catch him. I want this to end as well.” This time he didn’t lower his eyes. Instead, he looked straight at her and held eye contact with her while he spoke. And maintained eye contact for several moments afterward, until someone in the conference room coughed, breaking the spell. 

“Ian...”

Then Tanner walked briskly into the room, out of breath from having ran all the way from the other side of the building.

“M...003 contacted me. Barcelona was a bust. Nothing there,” he said.

“Bloody hell,” she said. She looked at Ian for confirmation that he had heard. He nodded. 

“Well, we still have a chance,” Ian said. “Want to keep the line open? Or I can contact you when I have information about the operation in Northern Virginia.”

M leaned onto the conference room table, looking directly into the camera. 

“I want him found, Ian. I want him handled,” she said, angrily. Bond noted a slight twitch in her right eye, just at the corner. And her pinky finger twitched as well. He knew that both movements were a major reaction for a woman who was usually cold and stoic. Bond had never seen such a brazen physical response like that from her before. He was probably the only one in the room who noted both nearly imperceptible movements from her body. Maybe Tanner, but he was already out of the conference room and down the hallway. 

She stood up straight and turned to leave but turned back again, remembering that he had asked her a question.

“Please, Ian, call me when you have something. Hopefully it’s good news this time,” she said gently. She was grateful that he hadn’t rubbed her nose in her mistake. She had been so sure that Ripper would be in Barcelona. 

Before he could respond she was gone. Bond watched the screen as Ian Smithson said something to someone standing off camera to his left. Then the screen went blank.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PRESENT DAY

 

“We’ve got him this time, M,” Bond said into his microphone, trying to keep an eye on his feet and the stairwells below him. He was running down a flight of stairs in an old building.

“Are you sure? We’ve been duped before.” 

“Yes...I actually saw him enter the room. It’s going down. Now. And right within the city of London,” Bond said, almost laughing. How ironic that the cross-agency search for this terrorist and his band of henchmen was going to come to a close less than three miles from the headquarters of MI6. He remembered a few months prior, when the CIA Director had believed that they were going to capture Ripper just a few miles from CIA headquarters but had found nothing. Bond was hoping that the same thing didn’t happen again today.

“Don’t lose him, Bond. Do NOT let him get away,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am.” 

He wondered if her eye was twitching.

He noted the sound of traffic in the background when she spoke, as if she were in her car, heading somewhere. He had left in her office an hour ago when they had received word that Ripper had been spotted not far from the headquarters. M had almost jumped out of her skin in her eagerness to get Bond out the door and after Ripper.

“Bond,” her voice followed him out the door. He stopped and turned around.

“I want him taken alive if possible. But...”

Bond nodded in response but noted that once again her right eye had twitched. Her hands were under the desk so he didn’t catch any movement in her fingers. She stared at him.

“What the fuck are you waiting for? Go!” 

He turned and left. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Bond shot Ripper twice: once in the mid-section and once near the heart. Bond knew that the bullet had probably torn his artery and that the man was going to die very soon. He had tried to take the man alive, but he had not cooperated. Killing him had been Bond’s only option.

Ripper fell to his knees then leaned back against a support post. He looked at Bond with a curious mix of regret, fear, and amusement. Blood was pouring from his body at a high rate, covering first his clothes, then the floor, with a slick coat of red. Bond was content to stand there and watch him bleed. He silently willed the man to die faster so he could get on with the rest of the day.

Out of his peripheral vision, Bond could see the door to the room slowly opening. He was surprised to see M standing there, looking at Ripper. He wondered if she showed up because she was anxious to see that he was wounded and dying...he had been causing her so much grief over the past year.

He watched curiously as M slowly walked over to him, the dead silence of the room enhancing the sound of her heels clicking on the cement floors. She stood in front of him, the same curious mix of regret and fear in her eyes. There was no amusement.

M slowly sat down on the floor opposite him, close enough that their bodies were touching. When Ripper reached for her Bond stepped forward, pulling his gun.

“Back away, Ripper. Leave her alone,” Bond demanded, stepping closer to M.

What the fuck was she doing?

“It’s alright, Mr. Bond,” she said quietly, holding up her hand to Bond, telling him to stop. He froze, unsure of what to do. He was an agent trained to kill on demand, a task that would be complete once Ripper died. But he was also trained to follow her orders and right now she was telling him to back off as a terrorist was reaching for her. He was conflicted. 

He knew Ripper couldn’t kill her, he was too badly wounded and losing his strength by the second. But he could still hurt her. 

He lowered his pistol but kept his finger on the trigger.

She wrapped her arms around Ripper and pulled him closer to her, cradling his upper body in her arms. Bond watched, transfixed, as she wrapped her arms tighter around him until her hands were touching behind his back. And Ripper wrapped his arms tighter around her. His arms were around her torso and his hands were on her back, leaving bloody handprints and smears on her gray coat.

“I’d like everyone to leave, please,” M said, still holding the gaze of the wounded man she was cradling in her arms. 

After some confused glances, the other three agents and Tanner left the room. Bond didn’t move.

“Mr. Bond?” she said, not even looking up at him.

“I am not leaving you alone with this man, M,” he responded firmly. His mind was trying to work out what he was watching, what the scene playing out in front of him meant. Why was M, the Chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service, not only out in the field, but providing comfort to a known terrorist, a man that operatives from four separate spy agencies had been chasing for a year? 

M was whispering something to Ripper. He in turn placed his left hand on her cheek, caressing it softly, and leaving a bright red streak from her temple to her lips. She made no move to stop him.

“I love you. I always have,” Ripper whispered, opening his eyes and looking at her. 

It was then Bond realized his eyes were the same color as M’s.

“I love you,” she responded, placing a tender kiss on his forehead.

“None of this was ever about you,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. He was going to die very soon.

“I know that.”

Ripper took one last, long look at her, holding her gaze until he was no longer breathing. 

M pulled the man closer to her, hugging him as tightly as she could. Bond could barely hear her as she gasped, trying to take in deep breaths. Her body was shaking. She was crying. 

Sobbing would be a better word. 

“M?” Bond whispered. He was at a total loss for words. 

After a few minutes she gathered her emotions together and looked up at Bond, now standing just a few feet away from her.

“Ripper. AKA Jonathan Michaelson,” she said quietly. “Born Samson Gregory Whitstone.”

Whitstone. The name sounded familiar. It wasn’t hers...her surname was Mansfield. Then he remembered. She had not taken her husband’s name when she married. 

Her husband. Whitstone. Dr. Emmett Whitstone. 

“Your son?” Bond replied, almost afraid to say the words. How could this man be her son? He had watched her give several briefings, in person and over secure video, about this man and his actions, never once letting on that she was plotting the death of her own son, that she was sending a small army of highly-trained agents out to kill her own flesh and blood. 

But then he remembered the twitching of her eye and her pinky. She had reacted, had let on to anyone who could see that she was in distress. Only Bond had caught her reaction. But had not known what he was seeing.

“Yes. My second-born.” 

She leaned forward to lay Ripper’s body on the floor and tried to stand up, but her legs didn’t seem to function. Bond stepped forward and hooked his hands under her armpits, lifting her to her feet.

She turned to face him. Her tears left a snake-like trail down her cheeks and through the blood smears. She had more tears in the corners of her eyes and her eyes were glassy with moisture. Her clothes were soaked in Ripper’s blood. Handprints were on her coat and face, the front of her blouse and skirt was completely red. The site of her was almost blinding to Bond.

He was speechless, didn’t know what to say. For a few moments they stared at each other. 

Finally Bond reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief. He wiped the tears out of her eyes, then wiped the blood off of her face. She didn’t move, standing still as he moved the cloth up and down her cheek, holding his gaze with an intensity that was unsettling.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he finally said, throwing the bloodied handkerchief on the floor.

Bond could feel an odd sense of anger rising in him. How could she not have told him? How could she have not said something to him? She had sent him, nay, ordered him out several times to capture or kill her own son. 

The anger was rising in his body, bubbling up from his core, making him a bit senseless and unsure of what to say. Or do. 

“To what end?”

Bond was grateful that Bill Tanner came back into the room, because at that point in time all Bond could think about was hurting her. 

Bond saw the look of shock on Tanner’s face when he saw her covered in blood, but he didn’t care. He needed to get away from her. From him. From all of this.

He turned and left the room.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

James Bond crept slowly up the dark staircase, keeping an eye on the door he knew led to her bedroom. He still had not figured out what to do with the husband once he woke them. He couldn’t kill him. Nor could he just turn him out on the street...it would only take him few minutes to sound the alarm to MI6 that his wife had been taken hostage. 

Bond would just have to figure it out as events unfolded.

The closer he got to her bedroom door, the deeper his anger pressed against him from the inside, expanding his ribs and making his lungs hurt. He had not spoken to her since leaving that room, the dead body of her son growing cold at her feet. 

At the moment she had revealed Ripper was her son, he had wanted to hit her, strangle her, somehow hurt her for keeping that secret from him. Bond had never before felt such emotional pain in his body and he didn’t know how to channel it outward and away from his heart. In hindsight he realized just how close he had come to physical violence against M, something he never thought he was capable of. 

Bill Tanner had no idea that he probably saved his boss from a lot of pain that day.

Now, four days later, Bond could no longer contain the rage that was festering in his body. It had grown as he followed the progress of Ripper’s body through the system as forensics and medical had gone over him and the other three men the MI6 agents had killed. He had read in the file that M had stopped the process of identification, knowing that a DNA test would reveal to all her secret. He didn’t know what reason she had used but her request was fulfilled without question. She was, after all, the Chief.

Now all four men were in the morgue at MI6 Headquarters, waiting for someone to claim their bodies. There were only a few days left before MI6’s protocol dictated cremation and burial in a small, unmarked cemetery outside of London. 

Bond wondered if she would let that happen to her son. So far, neither she nor her husband had claimed him. 

Now he was creeping down her upstairs hallway, in the dead of night, ready to confront her in her bedroom. He had deliberately picked this time and place. She would be surprised. Unprepared. And vulnerable.

He stood in the doorway, waiting for his eyes to readjust to the new level of darkness. There was some light coming in from the window, enough that Bond could clearly see the bed.

She was alone. 

Bond looked to his right, wondering if Emmett Whitstone, her husband, was in the loo. But it was dark, with no sound coming from there. He looked back to the bed and realized that the other side wasn’t rumpled. There was no sign of anyone having slept there that night.

He crossed the room silently, knowing that she could wake at any moment, possibly feeling a sense of danger, even in her sleep.

He sat on the chair in front of the window and waited.

For over an hour he sat motionless, watching the rise and fall of her chest as she breathed with the heaviness of sleep. She moved a few times, causing Bond to become tense. She was sleeping on her back, her left hand stretched across the bed, her right under the quilt. She was wearing purple silk pajamas.

He watched as she rolled away from him. Then it happened so quickly that Bond didn’t have time to react. 

M had reached under her pillow and grabbed the small pistol she kept there and in one swift move she had pulled it out, raised up on her knees, and pointed it at Bond’s head.

Bond didn’t move. He didn’t know if she realized it was him or not. And he really didn’t care. 

“What do you want?” Her voice was husky, still full of sleep.

Bond reached for the lamp next to him and turned on the light. They both winced as the light brightened the dark room.

“Don’t think that just because you’re a Double-Oh that I won’t shoot you,” she said, glaring at him.

“Go ahead, shoot me,” Bond said. “Shoot me here and here,” he said, pointing to his heart and stomach. “That’s where I shot him.”

M lowered the gun, then lowered her head. She looked defeated, a look Bond had never seen on her face before. 

He stood up.

“Why the bloody hell did you not tell me that Ripper was your son?” he yelled, approaching her.

“What difference does that make? He was a wanted international terrorist who did a lot of bad things and needed to be stopped,” she said looking up at him.

“But...” he started.

“Bond, he needed to be stopped. He was killing people and wreaking havoc on the economy of multiple countries. He doesn’t get special dispensation because I gave birth to him,” she said.

“And you being here just solidifies my reasoning...you would have hesitated when it came down to it. You never would have been able to pull the trigger if you had known who he was,” she added, a bit of anger rising in her voice. 

“And I needed you to pull the trigger,” she said, her voice cracking.

She wanted to stop talking. She wanted Bond to go away. She was exhausted. Had been emotionally and physically exhausted for months. The past few days she had just been going through the motions of work, not feeling, seeing or hearing anything. It had all been a blur. And it was getting harder and harder to keep up the façade that she was forced to put on every day to hide her secret. 

Bond stepped forward and grasped her shoulders. He was close enough to her that he could smell lavender on her skin. He started to shake her, his anger once again reaching a level that he couldn’t control.

“You should have told me,” he said sharply.

She said nothing as he shook her harder, repeating that she should have told him. Only when she whimpered in pain did Bond realize he was close to seriously hurting her. He released her. For a moment she stayed as she was, stunned, her eyes focused downward. Then she crawled back over to her side of the bed and laid down on her back, the gun still in her hand.

Bond laid down on the bed next to her. He could faintly smell men’s cologne on the pillow.

For ten minutes neither of them spoke, both too wound up to do anything but gaze at the ceiling, each wrapped up in their own thoughts.

“I don’t know when he turned bad. Up until he was 15 he was happy in school and doing sports. Then one day he got into trouble at school. It was downhill from there,” she said, so softly that Bond barely heard her.

“The last time I actually talked with him was 10 years ago. This last year of chasing him is the only contact I’ve had with him.”

“I honestly didn’t even know that Jonathan Michaelson was my son until I saw the surveillance footage from Munich.”

This surprised Bond.

“That was almost four months after he popped up on our radar as ‘wanted’,” Bond said. Bond himself had secured the footage from a Munich bank two days after a cyber-attack on their supposedly secure system. And he had been the one to show M that footage, the first time she had seen that one of the UK’s most wanted men was, in fact, her own flesh and blood.

Had her eye twitched then? Her pinky? He couldn’t remember. 

“Does Director Smithson know?”

“No. He’s met my husband but not my children. I never told him.”

“He’s not going to like that.”

M gave him no answer.

Finally Bond spoke, asking the obvious.

“Where is your husband?”

She didn’t answer at first, just sighed.

“M?” Bond asked again, turning to look at her profile on the pillow. 

“I don’t know.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I don’t know, Bond. When I got home he saw the blood on my clothes and the shock in my face. It didn’t take much to figure out what had happened. He grabbed his coat, said ‘I can no longer be married to you’ and left. I haven’t seen him since,” she said.

Stunned, Bond raised up on one elbow. Her husband had left her? Was the man insane?

“He’s been here during the day, while I am at work, getting his clothes and other things,” she continued. 

“Surely you could track...” Bond started to say.

“Of course I could track him, Bond. I have chosen not to. I had his son killed. He’s beyond upset. We’ve worked through many issues in our 47 years together, forgiven each other for mistakes. But our marriage won’t survive this. There is no forgiveness here,” she said, a small, uneven tremblor in her voice.

“I’m sorry, M.”

Neither of them spoke anymore. Bond laid back down on the pillow and listened to her breathe. 

Eventually they both fell asleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“So, it didn’t take you long to replace me.”

The man’s voice seeped into Bond’s brain as he climbed out of the depths of sleep. Next to him he could feel M stirring as well. 

A tall, gray-haired man was standing by the bed, still wearing his heavy overcoat. He had no emotion on his face. Bond leapt out of the bed, ready to defend both of them from this man that Bond assumed was the husband.

“Emmett, it’s not what you think,” M said, sitting up, then realizing she still had the pistol in her hand. She put it in the nightstand drawer. She looked at Bond moving slowly around the bed, looking at her for direction.

“Stop,” she said. He did.

“You’re in bed with a man. A very young man I might add. What other of your antics do I have to look forward to this week? What other secrets are you hiding? Because right now, I’m getting disgusted with you,” he said. His voice was dripping with ice.

“Oh for crying out loud, Emmett, he’s almost half my age and seriously not interested in an old, sagging woman like me,” she said, sliding out of the bed and walking past him into the loo. She slammed the door behind her.

Bond looked at the bedside clock. It said 9:30 a.m. How could they have slept so long? Where was M’s driver? Why hadn’t he sounded the alarm when she wasn’t out on the steps, waiting for him when he picked her up? Then he remembered. 

It was Sunday.

“And you are..?” asked the man.

“Bond. James Bond.”

“Whitstone. Emmett Whitstone,” he said mockingly. 

“If you could text me when you’re gone, then I could come back and get more of my things,” Emmett yelled over his shoulder to M. When he didn’t get a response, he turned and left the room. Bond waited a few minutes and when neither of them returned to the bedroom, he slipped down the stairs and out the front door. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Bond stiffened at the sound of the cypher lock on M’s front door unlocking. He stood still, his back against the wall just inside of the doorway into the living room.

Bond had been there for an hour, waiting for Whitstone to return as he had said he would. M was at the headquarters under the pretense of working. But he knew that she was still sitting at her desk, her chair facing the windows as she stared out at the Thames. 

That’s what she had been doing when he had left her over 2 hours ago.

He listened as he heard movement in the foyer, the sound of keys being placed on the table top, the sound of a coat being hung on the rack. Just as Emmett stepped into the living room, Bond came up to him quickly and placed one loop of a set of handcuffs on his left wrist. 

Emmett turned, in shocked response, but before another second passed, Bond had the other loop of the handcuffs on his right wrist. 

“Just cooperate. Don’t make a fuss,” Bond said.

“You’re the man I found in bed with my wife this morning,” he said angrily.

“Yes, well, trust me, nothing happened. She is far from my type.”

Emmett looked down at his wrists. 

“What do you want?”

“You to come with me, quietly.”

“Are you kidnapping me?”

“Something like that.”

With that, Bond grabbed Emmett’s elbow and led him out of the house to the waiting car. He opened the passenger side and shoved Emmett in. 

“Don’t even think about running away,” he growled.

Bond walked around to the driver’s side and got in. Emmett had not moved.

Bond drove through the streets of London, arriving an hour later at an old abandoned warehouse that looked dark and dirty. They had not spoken a word the entire journey. Emmett had not even looked at Bond, instead keeping a locked gaze at a point about 15 feet in front of the car.

Bond parked and then helped Emmett from the car, leading him through a series of passageways and staircases until they reached a large open room. In the center was a support post with a chair in front of it, a table behind. 

Emmett was starting to get worried. What had his wife gotten him into?

Bond didn’t release Emmett from the handcuffs as he shoved him down on the chair. Instead, he took long pieces of rope and looped them around Emmett’s elbows and around the support post. 

“Okay, Bond, I’ve been cooperative. What do you want?”

“I want to make you realize what a stupid fucking ass you are,” Bond said.

“I’m not...”

“Shut up. And yes, you are. You have absolutely no idea what is going on here,” Bond said sharply.

“I think I do, Mr. Bond.”

“Yes? I’ll bet you don’t know anything,” Bond said reaching for a large envelope on the table behind the chair. He showed it to Emmett, who looked at him quizzically.

“Look, I know once I release you you’re going straight to her and tell her everything. She’ll have me killed and no one will ever find my body. I get that. But at least I would have tried to make you see what an idiot you are,” Bond said.

He pulled out a large photograph from the envelope and shoved it in front of Emmett’s face. The photograph was of a man, covered in blood, hanging from unseen rafters. He was obviously dead. And he had obviously died a violent and painful death.

Emmett gasped but didn’t wince or look away. Bond knew he was a physician so probably had seen many a mangled body in his career.

“Robert Henderson. Your son did this,” Bond said, laying the photograph on the ground at Emmett’s feet.

“Okay, so what,” Emmett said, frustration rising in his voice.

Bond pulled another photograph out of the envelope. This one was a family portrait of the same man with his wife and two daughters, all smiling, all wearing the same color shirts. 

“This is his wife and two daughters. They got left behind when Ripper killed Henderson,” Bond said. 

“Ripper..?”

“Your son’s alias. What the intelligence world called him. What he called himself,” Bond said.

He laid the photograph on the ground, just above the first one.

Bond pulled out another photograph, this one of a burned-out vehicle parked in the middle of a field. He showed it to Emmett.

“Your son did this. Or ordered it. Doesn’t matter, he is responsible.”

Bond laid the photograph on the floor.

He pulled out three more photographs, all obviously family portraits. 

“This man died. This is his family,” Bond said, showing him one of the photographs with a man, a woman, and two small children. The man, obviously the father, had a red circle around his head. Bond placed the photograph on the floor.

“This woman died. These are her parents.” In the photograph was a woman with an older couple. Like the other photograph, she had a red circle around her face. 

“Another man died. I don’t have his photograph, but here are his children,” he said, showing him two photographs of children, one boy and one girl. They were smiling the foolish smiles of happy children. Bond wondered if they were still smiling.

Emmett said nothing. He just gazed at the photographs as Bond showed them to him then put them on the ground at his feet. 

Bond repeated this for over an hour, pulling out a photograph of a dead, mutilated body or bodies, someone who had died at the hands of Emmett Whitstone’s son, describing the scene in the photo and then placing it on the floor. That was followed by a second or third photograph of the victim’s family. Some were of spouses and children, others were of parents or siblings.

Eventually Emmett was surrounded by a large semi-circle of photographs. There was nowhere he could look where he would not be confronted by his son’s victims and their families.

“Okay, I’m starting to understand. He was a terrible person. But she didn’t have to...”

“It wasn’t her decision,” Bond cut him off.

“He was wanted by four countries and agencies, including CIA. Someone was going to eventually kill him. We just got to him first,” Bond said.

Bond picked up his coat from the table.

“I’ll give you some time to sit and think about this,” he said, putting on his coat.

Now Emmett was frightened.

“You’re leaving me here?”

“Yes. I want you to understand her pain. What it feels like to be abandoned when you need someone the most.”

Bond took a few steps towards the door.

“He was her son, too. She’s suffering far more than you are. And right now, she’s sitting in the same building as his body, completely unable to do anything.”

With that, Bond turned and left. He admired that Emmett didn’t call after him, didn’t bargain with him, and didn’t make empty promises to love his wife if Bond would only let him go. He kept walking until he got to the front door. He stopped to listen, to see if Emmett was now calling him. There was only silence.

Bond left.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

When he returned early the next morning he was surprised to see Emmett awake and looking at the ground, looking at the pictures. His face was ruddy and covered with morning stubble. He had bags under his eyes. 

Bond doubted the man had slept at all.

Without a word Bond cut the rope that was holding him to the support post. Then he came around front and used a small key to open the handcuffs. Bond took two steps back.

“Good day, sir,” was all he said.

Emmett Whitstone got up, stretched his legs and rubbed his wrists. They were red where the handcuffs had cut into the skin.

“There is a taxi waiting for you outside. I’ve given him enough money to get you all the way across London,” Bond said, not looking at the man. 

“Thank you,” Emmett said. Then he turned and walked out, leaving Bond wondering how much time he had left before she found him. Before she handled him. Before she made him pay for doing this to her husband. 

But James Bond wasn’t going to run. He wasn’t going to hide. He would wait patiently for whatever she decided to do.

And Bond also knew that whatever happened to him would be worth it. For her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

M hadn’t even noticed when Tanner got up from his desk and left the floor, not that he ever had to report to her if he was stepping away from his desk for a moment or two. She looked at his empty chair and wondered where he was, then quickly refocused her attention back on the stack of papers in front of her.

Moments later she looked up to see Tanner getting off of the elevator. Behind him was the tall, hulking frame of her husband. Now she understood that Tanner had gone down to the lobby to greet him and escort him through security and up to the floor. 

It took every fiber of her being, every ounce of her extensive training, not to react to her husband sneaking up on her like this. And making Tanner a part of it. She wanted to yell at Emmett, tell him to go away, but she didn’t want to make a scene.

Which, she instantly realized, was why her husband had snuck up on her: he knew she wouldn’t make a scene in front of her employees. It would be unprofessional.

She got up from her chair to meet them at the door of her office, a smile on her face. She hoped that it looked more real than it felt. 

Despite her anger, she was excited to see him, she had truly missed him. After he left the house yesterday morning, after finding her and Bond in bed together, she had sat on the couch in fear and shock, wondering if she would ever see her husband again. She’d already lost her son and now was going to lose her husband. Part of her had wanted to run after him, to try to explain Samson. And Bond. But part of her just wanted to disappear. She could do it very easily. It wouldn’t take much for her to be listed as one of MI6’s ‘missing and presumed dead’ agents. Just a phone call and a car ride. 

“Hello,” Emmett said, breaking into her thoughts of faked suicide. He entered her office and gave her a light kiss on her cheek. She reciprocated. 

He looked tired. He had bags under his eyes that could almost be considered bruises. 

“Hello,” she responded. She looked at Tanner.

“Thank you for escorting him up here,” she said to him, still smiling. She could see a hint of relief in his eyes. 

All morning long Tanner had sensed something wasn’t right with her but knew better than to ask. She was a private person and kept a strict boundary between her personal life and MI6, even with her most trusted employee. When Emmett had called and asked him to come and get him at the security desk, that he wanted to surprise his wife, he had been a bit unsure of what to do.

On the rare occasion that he came to the office it was M who had asked him to please meet him at the security desk and escort him to her office. M always knew when her husband or children was coming to the headquarters. 

Her husband had never before surprised her at work. Ever. 

Tanner turned and sat at his desk, burying himself in whatever file he could find, trying not to overhear any conversation. That was the downfall of the current office arrangement...M’s desk was at the window, and near the door were four desks, including Tanner’s and Valerie’s, M’s personal assistant. Private conversations were impossible. 

“What brings you here?” she said. 

“Just wanted to come by and say hello,” he said, smiling at her.

“Is there somewhere private we can go?” he added.

“Tanner, is the small conference room open?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

M nodded towards the door, indicating to Emmett that he should follow her. She led him down a hallway into a conference room that, thankfully, had walls that were wood, not glass. Once they closed the door they could not be seen by anyone. 

She only took a few seconds to start questioning him.

“Why are you here, Emmett? Why didn’t you call?” She had anger in her voice, but she really didn’t know why. 

He held up his hands in resignation.

“Relax, Peach. I’m here to surrender. I’m here to apologize. For leaving in anger, for staying away, for not understanding,” he said.

She was temporarily shocked by his words. He walked around to the other side of the conference room. The table now separated them.

“Emmett, I...I don’t know what to say. This is unexpected,” she said softly. She was at a loss for words, a rare experience for her.

“There isn’t much to say,” he responded. “But we’ll figure it out.”

She stared at him.

“Look,” he continued, “there is still a lot that makes me angry about this whole thing, but...I realize now how agonizing all this has been for you, how destructive that decision must’ve been for you. And I should have stuck by you,” he said softly. 

She just looked at him, wondering what had brought about this complete change in her husband.

“I know I caught you off guard, coming here unannounced, but I want you to know that...I want to work this out. We can fix this, right?”

“Of course,” she whispered.

He walked around the table to her and put his hands on her shoulders. He noticed that she winced under his pressure. 

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

Then she noticed the red marks on his wrists. She grabbed both of them and held them up to get a closer look at the marks.

“What the hell? Emmett, did somebody...”

But he cut her off before she could finish.

“It’s not important, my darling, just let it go,” he said emphatically.

Letting it go is the last thing she would do.

“I can’t believe this. Did someone force you somewhere? Force you to come here?”

“No, Peach, it was...”

“It was Bond, wasn’t it? I’ll kill him,” she growled.

Emmett had to laugh at that.

“That’s exactly what he said you would do. And yet, he persevered.”

M softened a bit at the fact that her husband wasn’t angry that one of her agents had kidnapped him.

“I didn’t sleep with him,” she said softly. “I mean, I didn’t have sex with him. I guess I did sleep with him.”

“I know. Although I wouldn’t blame you if you had. He is quite a handsome young man,” he said.

“Yes he is, but he can’t hold a candle to you, Emmett.”

Emmett smiled.

“Olivia,” he said, “don’t be angry with him. I’m not. He obviously cares about you. And frankly, I needed to see what an ass I was being. I needed to see things that you weren’t showing me,” he said.

M looked at him.

“What do you mean, ‘weren’t showing you’? What, exactly, did he show you?”

“Photos. Of people Samson killed, whether in an explosion or in a dark alley with a knife or a baseball bat. He also showed me photos of their spouses, children, and parents.”

M felt anger again rising within her body. How dare he! How dare Bond actually show him intelligence photographs of the carnage that Samson had either carried out or ordered. 

“You should have told me, Peach. I deserved to know what a monster our son was.”

“No, you didn’t deserve that. You deserved memories of him from when he was young. When he was happy. Before he turned,” she said softly. “I was trying to keep that from you.”

“You were willing to risk our marriage, willing to risk me hating you for the rest of my days, so that I would never know what he did?”

“Yes,” she said, almost sighing the word out loud. 

Emmett moved closer to her.

“And that’s why I love you,” he said, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her to him, holding her as tight as he could without hurting her. He kissed the top of her head then slowly kissed his way down her temple to her lips. She relaxed her body, eagerly waiting for him to reach her mouth. When he did, she returned his kisses, opening her mouth to let him in and running her hands up and down his body, enjoying his shape through his shirt.

Even though he’d been gone for only a few days she had missed him. She had missed him at home, waiting for her with a glass of whisky and a hot meal. She had missed him discussing the day’s events with her, his gentle voice like music in her ears after the din of business at MI6. But she had mostly missed him in bed...the warmth of his skin against hers, the heaviness of his body on top of hers as he gave her pleasure. 

Even at their age, and after 47 years of marriage, they still had an active and passionate sex life. ‘Like teenagers’ her daughter often said. M knew that the employees of MI6 thought her cold and unapproachable but the truth was she loved physical contact, loved sex with her husband. 

Without stopping the kisses, he backed her up to the conference room table, wrapped his hands around her waist and lifted her until her bottom was on the table. He started to lay her down on the table but her skirt was too tight for her to spread her legs for him. Emmett put his hands on her thighs and pushed her skirt up enough for her to make room for his body. As she moved her body backwards onto the table, she wrapped her legs around him tightly, pulling him closer to her. He was pleasantly surprised to see she was wearing lace-topped thigh-high stockings and black silk knickers. His favorites.

He bent over her, sliding her hands up her body until he had a breast in each hand, enjoying the soft moans she made as he touched her. He gently massaged her breasts until her nipples were hard before standing back up straight and putting his hands on her legs.

He slid his hands up her stockings, up the inside of her thighs and was about to touch her when she sat back upright.

“No, Emmett, not here, not now,” she said, panting, her broken voice betraying the fact that she really didn’t want him to stop.

Emmett pulled back, looking at her. Her legs were still wrapped around him.

“You know I’ve always wanted to fuck you in this building,” he said, breathing hard.

She breathed heavily in response.

“And I’ve always wanted to be fucked by you in this building. I’ve often fantasized about you taking me in my office, on my desk.”

Emmett groaned at the thought of doing just that. But he backed away, making her release her legs, before his now obvious arousal became too much to handle. 

“And we both know you’re not going to get inside me without lubricant.”

Emmet had to concede that point.

“Besides,” she continued, “I’m with the PM in 20 minutes. Tanner will be knocking on the door any minute now to remind me.”

She slid off the table and started to tug on the top of her rumpled stockings, twisting them back into place. Emmett watched her hands on her own thighs with renewed lust. He thought he might have to go into the bathroom and do some wanking just to get out of the building. She smoothed her skirt and pulled down her blouse and jacket.

Almost as if on cue, there was a timid knock on the door followed by Tanner’s voice stating it was time to go.

“On my way, Tanner,” responded M. She headed for the door. Just as she touched the handle, she turned back to her husband.

“I’ll come directly home after I leave the PM’s office. I’m sure I’ll be angry at something he said.”

“Oh, good. Anger AND makeup sex. I’ll be waiting.” 

Emmett grinned and followed his wife out of the conference room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

EPILOGUE

Bond had cleared Emmett to retrieve Samson’s body, saying the discovery of next of kin was based on classified evidence that he was not at liberty to share. The morgue crew never challenged him. The plan was for Emmett to drive his car to the funeral home, leave it, and take the Underground to the Headquarters. MI6 would deliver the body to the funeral home in an unmarked van, accompanied by Emmett and Bond. They would leave MI6 at 1 a.m. to keep the operation as clandestine as possible. 

So far, everything had gone to plan. Bond watched the morgue crew as they interacted with Emmett, looking for signs of recognition. He saw nothing. There was no connection made between Ripper, Emmett Whitstone and M. This small group of MI6 personnel was as far removed from M as possible and still be considered MI6 employees. Bond doubted they would have known who she was if she had walked into the morgue with her husband. 

But security would know. And the cameras would betray her. She could not be involved.

Bond saw her standing outside of the funeral home as the MI6 van containing her son’s body pulled into the parking lot. He almost missed her…she was standing in the dark wearing a black coat, her white hair covered by a hat or scarf. She was trained to stand in the shadows. But he was trained to seek and find in the shadows. 

He doubted her husband, sitting next to Bond, even saw her. 

The funeral crew came outside and Emmett crawled out of the van to greet them.

Bond got out of the van on the other side and walked over to her.

“M.”

“Bond.” She was staring intensely at the van, watching her husband and the men start to maneuver the coffin from the van into the funeral home. Emmett had told Bond that he had used some of his connections at the funeral home, made during years as a physician, to bring his son there in the middle of the night with no questions asked. 

“Where is your bodyguard? Or driver?” He had noticed no other car other than Emmett’s black Audi in the front parking lot. No Jaguar or Range Rover or any other standard MI6 vehicle.

“I imagine at this time of night they are at home, in bed, asleep.”

“You’re here alone? You’ve been standing out here without a bodyguard?” he asked, exasperated that she was here without any type of security detail. 

“The staff of the funeral home is here. Inside.” She still hadn’t taken her eyes off of the activity in front of her. The coffin was almost inside the building. Bond felt like he was having a one-sided conversation.

“M…”

“Bond, get over it. I’m here.” Her words were terse, short, and left no room for further argument. Bond dropped the issue. He was here now, could provide her protection. And he would see both her and her husband home safely, no matter how much she protested. 

“I see you and Emmett have made up after the…kidnapping,” she said, just a hint of sarcasm in her voice. It was the first mention between them of Bond taking her husband and tying him up overnight in a cold, dark warehouse. And it would no doubt be the last.

“Yes. He’s cordial enough. He’ll never like me.”

The truth was Emmett seemed to be barely tolerating Bond’s presence. He was showing modest appreciation for the escort and smooth transition of his son’s body from MI6 to the funeral home but not much more. He had said very little to Bond since they met at the lobby of MI6 an hour ago. While Bond didn’t expect them to be best friends, he had expected something more from Emmett, some higher level of civility.

She turned to face him. The coffin was now inside the funeral home, out of site. There was nothing left for her to watch.

“He wasn’t happy about the bruises on my shoulders,” she said quietly.

Bond felt a rush of guilt…a flood of emotion even more powerful than the urge to hurt her three days ago. Had he really put his hands on her? Had he really caused bruises on her body?

That explained Emmett’s behavior. Of course he would give a cold shoulder to someone who had obviously manhandled his wife. Bond wondered what she had said to convince Emmett that they had not had sex. Or worse, that Bond hadn’t forced himself on her. Between finding them in bed together, her clutching a loaded pistol, and the bruises, the evidence against him was overwhelming. 

“M, I’m sorry. I wish I could explain how I felt at the time, when I found out…when I realized your connection with Ripper. And that you’d kept that secret from me. That was a level of pain and confusion I’d never experienced before. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“Well, you did.”

She held his gaze.

“I don’t regret not telling you, Bond. That would be unprofessional.”

For a few minutes neither of them said anything. Bond figured at some point Emmett was going to come out in the parking lot looking for his wife. 

As they waited, Bond wondered if he needed to disappear for an extended period of time and give her a chance to think about his actions. Give him a chance to think about his actions. It would be easy enough; he did it all the time. No one would be suspicious.

“Don’t worry, Bond. I won’t have you killed.”

“I’m grateful,” he said, truthfully.

“But you are going on an extended mission. In Senegal. See the Quartermaster in the morning.”

With that, she started walking away from him, toward the building. 

“M, I’m going to see you home,” he called after her. “You shouldn’t be out at this hour without a bodyguard.” 

“Suit yourself,” she said, not even turning around. 

Bond watched her until she was a small silhouette in the frame of the funeral home’s door, the bright lights of the lobby shining brightly around her. He saw her husband cross the lobby and take her in his arms. Then they both turned and walked into the funeral home.


End file.
